K. Hamsun "Growth of the soil"

This is the only book from the mandatory reading list (for school, I mean) I've posted. Have to say that I think it's not really a book that high school students in general would appreciate but it's that way with 99% of the mandatory books. Although others (my classmates and other "regular non-book-lovers") seemed to consider it an absolute waste of one's time, I have to disagree.

This was quite thought-provoking. Considering the fact it wasn't written "in a normal manner" but it had its own twist (which was probably one of the reasons for its Nobel prize), it helped to better communicate the message the author was trying to send out. It seemed like simple language use, a primitive text... but that's the whole point. It just might seem weird to read.

The story went through a part of the life of a simple man. At first there was no country, nobody owned land... so he went and built himself a house. He got different animals and built more buildings. He did an honest man's hard work - building, taking care of animals, fields... he didn't wish to have anything to do with politics or such. His work made him happy. As he got herself a woman with whom he had children, he was being pulled into this 'other world'. A world of scheming, small talk, politics...

So the whole book focuses on the 'battle' between 'simple life' and 'city life'. It was clear the author (and several other realists like Dostoevsky and Tolstoy) preferred the farmer's life. But it's an ongoing debate: which is better? The so-called easy way which actually means more hard work than the "hard way"?

The concept may seem kind of foreign for a teenager (especially a town/city-bred kid who doesn't really care about anything else than the next party), since there really isn't a point of comparison for this certain debate. But if you try to look at the big picture...

John Stuart Mill once said, "It is better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied; better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied. And if the fool, or the pig, are of a different opinion, it is because they only know their own side of the question. The other party to the comparison knows both sides."

And that is the same thing going on here. The "simple life" is the life of a "pig" while the "city life" is the life of "Socrates". I respect Mill's opinion and agree with it. I believe there are many of those that don't agree... but its their choice to make and I see why it's so tempting.

Why bother yourself with thinking if in the end you'll only end up unhappy? It's so much easier to simply live and have fun... They're two ends of a stick, the how-I-look-at-life twig. There are those who are at one end and others at the other end. They're both good options...

The point is, there is no wrong or right here. It's a personal thing. This book showed Hamsun's way of looking at life or how he wished to live... since he must have been an intellectual, a Socrates.